A former Mussolini-run concentration camp is transforming into a luxury resort

Lustica Bay
On May 30, 1942 — in the throes of World War II — a tiny island adrift in the Adriatic Sea was transformed. What began as a humble fort built 100 years earlier turned into a concentration camp run by dictator Benito Mussolini, where prisoners were held captive and tortured.

That fort, known as Fort Mamula in honor of its 1853 creator, General Lazar Mamula, is now seeing a second transformation.

Earlier this January, real-estate company Orascom Development Holding announced plans to invest $16.8 million to turn Mamula into a "world-class boutique hotel and spa" that will be "completely eco-friendly by using renewable energy sources, and energy efficient materials."

Lustica Bay, as envisioned by Orascom.
Lustica Bay
Fort Mamula is located on Lastavica island, which sits on Montenegro's northwestern coast.

According to University of Cambridge historian Andrew Lacey, in the early 1940s Mussolini turned Mamula into a prison death camp as part of his overall effort to control the Balkan region.

Mamula Fort in its current state.
Wikimedia Commons
Stories from the concentration camp are expectedly heartbreaking.

"If the baby cried, soldiers would come in and beat everyone up until there was silence," Jovanka Uljarevic, the granddaughter of a woman held in the camp, told Balkan Insight. "It was cold, they were starved and the overall conditions were very bad."

The fort was semi-abandoned in the aftermath of WWII, used by tourists looking to see a bit of history. It wasn't until earlier this year that Orascom entered the picture, provoking a divided response from local residents, politicians, and families of those who were kept in the camp.

Orascom has said it will create a specific remembrance room to honor those who died during WWII, while Former United Nations Secretary General Boutros Boutros-Gali once said in a letter to the Montenegrin parliament that he's surprised that "the only solution for preserving and using the fort is a mere business arrangement and privatisation agreement."

A rendering of the future of Mamula Fort.
Orascom
While the island will no doubt entertain — it'll boast a DJ booth, beach club, swimming pools, restaurant, and spa — Lacey says he hopes Orascom will indeed erect some form of a memorial, for the sake of the island's history.

Although, he does point to the dilemma places like Mamula face.

"Do you knock it down and pretend it never happened, or do you acknowledge what happened and move on?" he says. "We've got to acknowledge where we come from and what this once was. I think some people might actually be interested in the history of the place."